Clinton Challenges Pakistanis on Al Qaeda

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Clinton challenges Pakistan on Al Qaeda

LAHORE, Pakistan — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, on a visit meant to improve relations with Pakistan, strongly suggested Thursday that some Pakistani officials bore responsibility for allowing terrorists from Al Qaeda to operate from safe havens along this country’s frontier.

“I find it hard to believe that nobody in your government knows where they are, and couldn’t get to them if they really wanted to,” she said to a group of Pakistani journalists on her second day here. “Maybe that’s the case; maybe they’re not gettable. I don’t know.”

It is extremely rare for an official of Mrs. Clinton’s rank to say publicly what American politicians and intelligence officials have said in more guarded ways for years. The remarks upset her hosts, who have seen hundreds of soldiers and civilians killed as Pakistan has taken on a widening campaign against militant groups that have threatened the country from its tribal areas.

But the remarks gave voice to the longtime frustration of American officials with what they see as the Pakistani government’s lack of resolve in rooting out not only Al Qaeda, but also the Taliban leadership based in Quetta, and a host of militant groups that use the border region to stage attacks on American and NATO forces in Afghanistan.

Mrs. Clinton’s statement was only one of several pointed remarks on issues ranging from security to poor tax collection during a day in which she ran into a wall of distrust and mostly hostile questioning in public appearances intended to soothe relations, suggesting she was no longer willing merely to listen to Pakistan’s grievances.

The shift in tone came after a meeting with university students in which she expressed regret about past injustices in the American-Pakistani relationship, as well as about the disputed American presidential election in 2000, which she said showed that all democracies were flawed.

“We have to decide if we want to move beyond the past in your country and in our country,” Mrs. Clinton said. “We are now at a point where we can chart a different course.”

Rarely in her travels as secretary of state has Mrs. Clinton encountered an audience so uniformly suspicious and immune to her star power as the polite, but unsmiling, university students who challenged her at Government College University in Lahore.

One after another, they lined up to grill Mrs. Clinton about what they see as the dysfunctional relationship between Pakistan and the United States. They described a litany of slights, betrayals and misunderstandings that add up to a national narrative of grievance, against which she did her best to push back.

Why did the United States abandon Pakistan after the Soviet Union withdrew from Afghanistan, they asked. Why did the Bush administration support the previous military government of Gen. Pervez Musharraf? What about reports in the Pakistani news media that American contractors illegally carried weapons in Islamabad?

In a later exchange with American journalists, Mrs. Clinton did not try to temper her remarks, saying they would contribute to a healthier, more open relationship with Pakistan. But the American ambassador, Anne W. Patterson, sought to put them in a broader context of efforts to persuade the government to root out militants in its frontier regions.

“We often say there needs to be a focus on finding these leaders,” Ms. Patterson said.

“Most of Al Qaeda is in South Waziristan,” she added, referring to the frontier area near Afghanistan where the Pakistani Army is conducting a campaign against militants.

Mrs. Clinton’s comments were prominently played on Pakistani news channels, and government officials rejected her assertion.

“If we knew where Al Qaeda’s leaders were, or if we had meaningful intelligence on their whereabouts shared with us, we would act against them,” said a senior official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly on this issue.

At times during this three-day visit, Mrs. Clinton has sounded less like a diplomat than a marriage counselor. But her soothing approach has won her few friends. She got tepid applause from the students here, some of whom groaned when she defended American policies.

Two weeks ago, by contrast, Mrs. Clinton challenged the Russian government to open up its political system, allow more dissent and strengthen its legal system, in a speech at Moscow State University. She got an enthusiastic standing ovation from the nearly 2,000 students.

Here, even her fans came armed with spears. A young female medical student thanked Mrs. Clinton for being an inspiration to women, then asked her how the United States could justify ordering Predator strikes on targets in Pakistan without sharing intelligence with its military.

Mrs. Clinton declined to comment on the program, which is run by the Central Intelligence Agency. But she said, “The war that your government and your military are waging right now is an important one for the country.”

The Obama administration’s aggressive support for Pakistan’s campaign in South Waziristan has put Mrs. Clinton in a delicate position. She has praised the army at every opportunity, while expressing regret for the wave of terrorist attacks the campaign has set off across the country, like the fiery car bomb that killed more than 100 people in the northwest city of Peshawar hours after her arrival on Wednesday.

Despite heightened security concerns, Mrs. Clinton stuck to her schedule, traveling to Lahore to meet opposition leaders and tour the majestic Badshahi Mosque, as thousands of police officers lined the route of her motorcade, shutting down the center of this city of 10 million.

At the university, a young man said that President Obama had failed to fix policies on Iraq or detainees, and told Mrs. Clinton that the United States was forcing Pakistan into a ruinous war.

Mrs. Clinton noted that the government had decided to fight only after its efforts to cut a deal with militants failed. “Slowly, but insidiously, you were losing territory,” she said. “If you want to see your territory shrink, that’s your choice. But I don’t think that’s the right choice.”

Those comments, made at the end of the meeting, set the stage for Mrs. Clinton’s feisty appearance later in the day.

At a roundtable session with businesspeople, Mrs. Clinton bluntly told an all-male audience that Pakistan needed to do a better job of collecting taxes and taking care of its poor. “When you ask for a partnership, you have to ask what Pakistan’s equity stake is,” she said.

Listening patiently to a litany of grievances from journalists about American policies, Mrs. Clinton said, “I am more than willing to hear every complaint about the United States.” But she said the relationship had to be a “two-way street.”
 

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“Hard to believe Pak has no idea about al-Qaeda whereabouts”

“Hard to believe Pak has no idea about al-Qaeda whereabouts”
Updated on Friday, October 30, 2009, 11:06 IST

Lahore: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who is on a three day tour of Pakistan, has reiterated that Al-Qaeda leadership is present in that country, and said that it is hard to believe that a civilian government has no idea about its whereabouts.

“I find it hard to believe that nobody in your government knows where they are and couldn’t get them if they really wanted to,” The Daily Times quoted Clinton, as saying.

“Maybe that’s the case; maybe they’re not gettable. I don’t know... As far as we know, they are in Pakistan,” Clinton told mediapersons here.


She said Pakistan is facing numerous problems and with such a large population to feed the issue has only aggravated.

Clinton stressed that Islamabad must tackle problems related to its ever increasing population.

“You do have 180 million people. Your population is projected to be about 300 million. And, I don’t know what you’re going to do with that kind of challenge, unless you start planning right now,” Clinton said.

Clinton also met Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani at the General Headquarters (GHQ) in Rawalpindi and exchanged views on a host of security-related issues.

Issues pertaining to Pak-US strategic relations, including their cooperation in the ‘war on terror’, and the ongoing military offensive against the Taliban in South Waziristan were also discussed in the meeting, the sources said.

US Special Representative for Pakistan and Afghanistan Richard Holbrooke, US Ambassador in Pakistan, Anne W. Peterson and Director General Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) Lieutenant General Ahmad Shuja Pasha also attended the meeting.

Matters relating to the Kerry-Lugar Bill and secret information sharing were discussed, the sources added.

ANI
?Hard to believe Pak has no idea about al-Qaeda whereabouts?

Pakistan missed chances with al Qaeda: Hillary
Updated on Thursday, October 29, 2009, 21:10 IST

Islamabad: US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is suggesting that Pakistan's government has squandered chances to kill or capture al Qaeda leaders.

She made the remark in an interview on Thursday with Pakistani journalists during a trip to the city of Lahore. She later flew to the capital, Islamabad, for talks with Army Chief and additional meetings.

Hillary said al Qaeda has used Pakistan as a haven since 2002. She said she finds it hard to believe that nobody in Pakistan's government knows where the leaders of Osama bin Laden's terrorist network are hiding.

She also said she finds it hard to believe that Pakistani authorities couldn't "get them" if they wanted to.

Earlier, she said that Pakistan had little choice but to take a more aggressive approach to combating the Pakistani Taliban and other insurgents that threaten to destabilise the country.

With the country reeling from Wednesday's devastating bombing that killed at least 105 people in Peshawar, Hillary engaged in an intense give-and-take with students at the Government College of Lahore, insisting that inaction by the government would have ceded ground to terrorists.

"If you want to see your territory shrink, that's your choice," she said, adding that she believed it would be a bad choice.

Dozens of students rushed to line up for the microphone when the session began. Their questions were not hostile, but showed a strong sense of doubt that the US can be a reliable and trusted partner for Pakistan.

Hillary met with the students on the second day of a three-day visit to Pakistan, her first as Secretary of State. The Peshawar bombing, set off in a market crowded with women and children, appeared timed to overshadow her arrival. It was the deadliest attack in Pakistan since 2007.

Hillary likened Pakistan's situation — with Taliban forces taking over substantial swaths of land in the Swat valley and in areas along the Afghan border — to a theoretical advance of terrorists into the United States from across the Canadian border.

It would be unthinkable, she said, for the US government to decide, "Let them have Washington (state)" first, then Montana, then the sparsely populated Dakotas, because those states are far from the major centres of population and power on the East Coast.

Hillary was responding to a student who suggested that Washington was forcing Pakistan to use military force on its own territory. It was one of several questions from the students that raised doubts about the relationship between the United States and Pakistan.

During her hour-long appearance at the college, Hillary stressed that a key purpose of her three-day visit to Pakistan, which began on Wednesday, was to reach out to ordinary Pakistanis and urge a better effort to bridge differences and improve mutual understanding.

"We are now at a point where we can chart a different course," she said, referring to past differences over an absence of democracy in Pakistan and Pakistani association with the Taliban in Afghanistan.

As a way of repudiating past US policies toward Pakistan, Hillary told the students "there is a huge difference" between the Obama administration's approach and that of former president George W Bush.


"I spent my entire eight years in the Senate opposing him," she said to a burst of applause from the audience of several hundred students. "So, to me, it's like daylight and dark."

Although Hillary said she was making a priority of engaging frankly and openly on her visit, she declined to talk about a subject that has stirred some of the strongest feelings of anti-Americanism here — US drone aircraft attacks against extremist targets on the Pakistan side of the Afghan border.

The Obama administration routinely refuses to acknowledge publicly that the attacks are taking place.

"There is a war going on," she said, and the US wants to help Pakistan be successful.

The drone attacks have killed a number of Pakistani civilians, while also reportedly succeeding in eliminating some high-level Taliban and other extremist group leaders.

At the same time, though, the US has been providing Pakistani commanders with video images and target information from its military drones as Pakistan's Army pushes its ground offensive in Waziristan, US officials said earlier this week.

Also sensitive is the way the US has handled millions of dollars in aid to the Pakistani military. The US in recent months has rushed helicopters and other military equipment to the country as Islamabad has launched its counterinsurgency offensives in Swat Valley and South Waziristan.

The administration sped the delivery of 10 Mi-17 troop transport helicopters starting in June, and in July sent 200 night vision goggles, nearly more than 9,000 sets of body armour, several hundred radios and other equipment.

"We've put military assistance to Pakistan on a wartime footing," Lt Col Mark Wright, a Pentagon spokesman, said Thursday. "We are doing everything within our power to assist Pakistan in improving its counterinsurgency capability."

This year the Pentagon plans to spend more than USD 500 million on arms and equipment for Islamabad as well as training Pakistan's military in counterinsurgency tactics. Still, Pakistani officials last month complained that Congress attached too many conditions to the surge in aid.

Before flying to Lahore from Islamabad, Hillary visited the Bari Imam shrine, named after Shah Abdul Latif Kazmi, a 17th century Sufi saint who died in 1705 and later came to be known as the patron saint of Islamabad. A suicide bomber struck the shrine in May 2005, killing a number of people.

Bureau Report
Hillary, Pakistani students in lively exchange
 

F-14

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uncle is getting mad guys wonder wather the vipers and green backs will be impounded
 

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In Military Campaign, Pakistan Finds Hint of 9/11

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SHERWANGAI, Pakistan — Pakistani forces pushing toward a lair of hard-core Taliban fighters found documents this week linked to a member of the Hamburg cell of Al Qaeda that is believed to have planned the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

In a small village in the dun-colored hills of South Waziristan, soldiers found a German passport belonging to Said Bahaji, a German citizen and associate of Mohammed Atta, the leader of the 9/11 hijackers.

The passport was issued in Hamburg in January 2001 and was accompanied by a Pakistani visa dated March 2001. The documents indicated that Mr. Bahaji landed in Karachi from Istanbul on Sept. 4, 2001.

The apparent presence of Mr. Bahaji in the tribal areas of Pakistan is a clear indication that members of the Qaeda network — including participants in the 9/11 plot — have taken refuge here, as American officials, like Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Thursday, have charged.

There was no indication that Mr. Bahaji had left Pakistan, authorities said.

Although Mr. Bahaji was not a central plotter in the Sept. 11 attacks, he lived for eight months in Hamburg with Mr. Atta and Ramzi bin al Shibh, according to the 9/11 Commission Report.

He was described in the report as “an insecure follower with no personality and with limited knowledge of Islam.”

It added: “Atta and Binalshibh used Bahaji’s computer for Internet research, as evidenced by documents and diskettes seized by German authorities after 9/11.”

A United States counterterrorism official said the documents “appear to be this guy,” and that American officials believe “he’s in Pakistan and is a senior Qaeda propagandist.” The official spoke anonymously to discuss classified assessments of Al Qaeda.

Soldiers also found a Spanish passport belonging to Raquel Burgos Garcia, who is believed to be Mr. Bahaji’s wife. She wore an Islamic headscarf in her passport photo; an accompanying identity card showed that she had attended school in Morocco.

The documents were shown to reporters on a day trip organized by the army on Thursday for the news media to observe operations in the nearly two-week-old battle. South Waziristan is off limits to foreign reporters, and most Pakistani reporters, without special permission.

The army was using artillery and jet fighters to break the back of the militants. Rounds of artillery thundered around the mountains at midday, and the sound of jets echoed through the valleys.

The offensive in South Waziristan has turned into a battle of wills between the army, the custodian of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons and accustomed to facing archenemy India, and insurgents from the Taliban and Al Qaeda, who are determined to bring down the state.

The guerrillas established a sanctuary here four years ago to plan their operations.

In retaliation, the insurgents have struck with ferocity at Pakistan’s urban centers and military installations using sleeper cells and commando fighters to wreak havoc and fear, killing large numbers of civilians like never before.

The assaults, particularly a car bomb that killed more than 100 people in the narrow alleys of an old bazaar in Peshawar on Wednesday and was aimed at women and children, are interpreted by many Pakistanis as an effort to break the will of the public and turn opinion against the military operation.

The militants, they point out, are not concerned with public support and just want to be left alone in their faraway stronghold, which has become a magnet for foreign militants from diverse backgrounds, according to an array of documents captured in houses by the Pakistani military.

So far, the public appears to be supportive of the army and impatient with the militants, though many Pakistanis ask whether a foreign hand, meaning the United States or India, is behind the militants.

In the past, the army fared poorly in South Waziristan, the southernmost region of the tribal areas where the Taliban and Al Qaeda have operated at will.

In 2005, under the president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, the army forged a peace deal in South Waziristan with Baitullah Mehsud, then the leader of the Pakistani Taliban, in a move that legitimized Mr. Mehsud’s authority with the Mehsud tribesmen.

A series of embarrassing encounters for the military followed. In 2007, the militants seized more than 40 soldiers at their fort at Sararogha and killed most of them.

Last year, the military abandoned its fort at Ladha, another militant stronghold, and the insurgents promptly blew up the British colonial-era structure.

Now the military is trying to recapture its reputation in South Waziristan, and to re-establish its presence. It is doing so with many more soldiers than in past operations in South Waziristan, said Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, the military spokesman, who ushered reporters around on a M-17 helicopter.

In addition to the militants’ passports, found in the village of Chalvashti, soldiers discovered a small house in a nearby town marked as a “laboratory” that was used for the manufacture of roadside bombs, Brig. Mohammed Shafiq said.

On the top of a rocky outpost called Spin Jamaat in Sherwangai, the commander of the forces in the area, Gen. Khalid Rabbani, sounded a confident note as he surveyed a vast landscape of hills and scarce vegetation. “The terrorists have gone into deeper areas, and the exits are choked,” he said.

But the fact that the insurgents were retreating deeper inside their stronghold around the towns of Makeen, Ladha and Sararogha, near densely forested mountains, may not bode well for the army.

“I am afraid the army is being sucked in and then the terrorists will hit hard using hit-and-run tactics,” said a resident of the Mehsud area recently.

So far, the army has concentrated on taking territory along the main road, a thin ribbon of rock-strewn gravel that was first laid down by the British. The troops have proceeded slowly, even though this roadside terrain was relatively easy, compared to the mountain passages that lay ahead, soldiers said.

The next target, Kuniguram, has served as the headquarters for the Uzbek fighters, the Taliban’s most brutal warriors. The army had surrounded Kuniguram on three sides, General Rabbani said, and clouds of white smoke from artillery fire onto the ridge in front of Kuniguram could be seen in the early afternoon.

The army expected its toughest fight so far to capture Kuniguram, the most substantial town under militant control that it had taken on so far, the general said.

On a separate axis from Kuniguram, the army was approaching Sararogha, the operational hub of the Taliban, General Abbas said.

It appeared, he said, that Wali ur-Rehman, the second in command of the Pakistani Taliban, was directing operations from Sararogha, where the army signed a peace deal with Mr. Mehsud, the former head of the Pakistani Taliban. Mr. Mehsud was killed in an American drone attack in August.
 

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Pak as usual playing double games with USA. Mushy already admited that aid money from U.S was used in buying arms to counter India. USA and world needs stricter actions against Pak. Hope kerry lugar bill works.
 

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9/11 passport 'found in Pakistan'

BBC NEWS | South Asia | 9/11 passport 'found in Pakistan'

Pakistan's army says it has found in South Waziristan the passport of a man linked to two hijackers involved in the 11 September 2001 attacks in the US.

The passport of Said Bahaji, a German of Moroccan origin, was among weapons, documents and jihadi literature seized by troops in the conflict zone.

The army showed the document to a group of reporters during a trip to the area.

The BBC's Orla Guerin says there is no way of knowing if this passport is real or was found where they say it was.

Our correspondent was part of a team of journalists who were taken to South Waziristan by the military.

Pakistan's army is carrying out a major offensive in the area against the Taliban and al-Qaeda militants and the region is generally out of bounds for journalists.

Said Bahaji is suspected to be a member of the Hamburg cell which planned the 9/11 attacks.

He is believed to have been a close associate of Mohammad Atta, the leader of 9/11 hijackers.

He fled Germany shortly before the attacks and remains at large.

Mr Bahaji has been charged in his absence in connection with several thousand murders committed in the attacks.

Correspondents says if the document is authentic, this will be the first time a direct link can be established between the Taliban in South Waziristan and the 9/11 attacks.
 

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Very interesting developments. The usually calm Ms Clinton snapped today and that shows the frustration within the US admin as to what they think about Pakistans role in the WOT.

But such is the nature of the war there, that Pakistan will now light up a convoy or two and make the US come around to say things in more flowery language and shower more money.

But all in all, this episode there has clearly shown what the admin in US thinks notwithstanding their public bonhomie so far. Now even that has blown away.
 

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i love the line : if you want to see you terrority shrink that's your choice?
I have never heared such un diplomatic word's used by an american directed towards pakistan.After many wastes years,the amreican's have finally learnt what india has said for years.Regarding the deception pakistan perpetrate and there refusal to acknowledge the truth coupled with there support for terrorist groups.
 

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US frustration with Pakistan

Pakistan must be the only state in the history of the world where they are billing a third country to fight their internal war. South Waziristan, Swat are well within the borders of Pakistan and for years the authorities tried to buy peace and were forced to fight back when the bad guys started having territorial ambitions. As Ms.Clinton said today in Islamabad:
Hillary engaged in an intense give-and-take with students at the Government College of Lahore, insisting that inaction by the government would have ceded ground to terrorists.

"If you want to see your territory shrink, that's your choice,"
she said, adding that she believed it would be a bad choice.
There have been cases in the past where the US has supported the British for example during WWII, but there was an equal effort from the British side. they put in all their available resources, and then some more in the war.
But looking at the current state in Pakistan they are pleased to bill the US with inflated billing to procure the latest weaponry for their armed forces who still call the shots in the running of the country. Their efforts have till date been half heated to sy the least.

Based on the number of terrorists that the PA is facing and also the hostile environment they should have committed more troops in SW, but no still the major bulk of the army is on the eastern border facing India. Somebody should remind the powers that be in Pakistan that in last 3 decades they have lost territory to the Taliban and not to India. It is time for them to decide who is their main enemy and threat to their nation state.
 

bengalraider

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I think the Americans are finally calling Pakistan's bluff. for the last few years Pakistan has been playing a savage game with it's own people, first letting the Taliban torture and kill them and then using their deaths to get funds from the U.S, the Pakistani elite have lined their pockets with funding provided for the W.O.T. Mrs Clinton makes a grim point if Pakistan chooses to let it's territory fall sooner or later the world is going to have to step in to stop the Taliban this time it may not only be money flowing into government coffers this time it may mean troops on the ground directly.
 

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A hard hitting Editorial in today's edition of the Daily Times, Pak.

EDITORIAL: Is Al Qaeda in Pakistan?

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, talking about Al Qaeda, said in Lahore on Thursday that she found it “hard to believe that nobody in your government knows where they are and couldn’t get them if they really wanted to”. She added: “As far as we know, they are in Pakistan”. The stock answer from Pakistan of course is: “If you have any hard information about where the top leaders of Al Qaeda are, tell us, and we will get them for you”.

This has gone on for a long time. The argument between the US-NATO forces in Afghanistan on the one side and the Pakistani authorities on the other could not be conclusive, and so the formulation both accepted on the issue is: Al Qaeda leaders are somewhere on the border of Afghanistan and Pakistan. This absolves both sides of the charge of not taking on the terrorists on the territories they control (sic!). But this is a logically untenable formulation.

Al Qaeda and its leaders could not locate themselves on the Durand Line as a line drawn on ground. If Osama bin Laden were to stand on it he would either fall on the Pakistani side or the Afghan side. The only conclusion one can draw is that there is obfuscation here and a measure of “passing the buck” by two parties not fully in control of things. There is a possibility that there is also an insufficiency of intent to take on Al Qaeda and finish it off. Meanwhile Osama bin Laden teeters on the Durand Line.

Circumstantial evidence is unending. Drone attacks regularly kill foreigners who can only be interpreted as Al Qaeda adjuncts. On the Pakistani side, there is a tendency to divide the terrorists into three categories: the Afghan Taliban who are good, the Pakistani Taliban who are bad, and the “foreigners” sheltered by some Pakistani Taliban who are bad too. These categories are patently false as is often proved by printed notices issued by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) naming Osama bin Laden and Mullah Umar as its patrons.

Pakistan can hardly know what is going on in the areas it has lost control of.
Its intelligence was always weak in the tribal areas but it tapered off in 2001 after Pakistan decided to join the US in its war against terrorism. The strategic ambivalence practised by General Musharraf actually gave rise to rumours that the intelligence agencies were playing both sides and that retired officers were involved in implementing this strategy even as Pakistan caught the largest number of Al Qaeda terrorists found anywhere in the world and handed them over to the US.

The world outside knows more about the activities of Al Qaeda in Pakistan than do Pakistanis. Most of them believe that Al Qaeda doesn’t exist and that Osama bin Laden is in an American jail even as America manufactures excuses to invade Islamic nations. The news that the passport of Said Bahaji, a prominent member of the Hamburg cell that carried out the 9/11 attacks, was found in South Waziristan has been carried in the Pakistani press after appending “so-called” before Hamburg.

Pakistan never had much of a clue about what Al Qaeda was doing in Pakistan. Ramzi bin al-Shibh, the 20th attacker who could not make it to the US, was caught in Karachi after American investigators located him. Abu Zubayda was only reluctantly confronted and caught by the local police in Faisalabad on the “pointation” of US investigators. Since Al Qaeda stayed close to the jihadis, and since the jihadis were kosher, they had a free run of Pakistan. Today, Pakistanis certainly don’t hate Al Qaeda as much as they hate the US.

The distraction is actually spread by the state institutions. The people are shown two enemies: the US and India. Interior Minister Rehman Malik, who is usually quite factual, hints that the “bad” Taliban are being financed and armed by the US and India. His condemnation of Al Qaeda falls on deaf ears because of the logic he destroys every time he speaks like that: why should Al Qaeda be condemned if the suicide-bombers are being bought and sent out with Indian and American money? At times Al Qaeda must be put off by the fact that Pakistanis deny it the credit of having carried out the 9/11 attacks. *

Daily Times - Leading News Resource of Pakistan
 

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Clinton's Tough Talk in Pakistan Drives Home Message: It's Not a One-Way Street

The secretary of state's blunt remarks, foreign policy experts say, give Pakistan's leadership a much-needed dose of reality: their relationship with the United States is not a one-way street.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton took off the gloves and delivered a no-holds-barred message to Pakistan this week, telling the American ally that it must step up its efforts to apprehend Al Qaeda terrorists and demonstrate a real commitment to democracy.

The secretary's blunt remarks, foreign policy experts say, give Pakistan's leaders a much-needed dose of reality: their relationship with the United States is not a one-way street.

America's top diplomat struck an unusually frank tone when she said Pakistan has squandered opportunities to kill or capture Al Qaeda leaders -- including Usama Bin Laden.

"I find it hard to believe that nobody in your government knows where they are and couldn't get them if they really wanted to," she told a group of Pakistani journalists in Lahore as she wrapped up her three-day visit to Pakistan. "Maybe that's the case. Maybe they're not gettable. I don't know."

During her trip, Clinton reaffirmed America's pledge to provide $7.5 billion in non-military aid to the troubled nation over the next five years. But she made clear that it will not be a handout.

Clinton said the U.S. wants to partner with Pakistan on more than just the military front, but she made clear that the government in Islamabad will have to be America's partner in tracking down and capturing the terrorists who masterminded the September 11 attacks, among so many others throughout the world.

Clinton defended the bluntness of her remarks in an interview Friday on ABC's "Good Morning America, saying, "Trust is a two-way street. There is trust deficit."

"It will not be sufficient to achieve the level of security that Pakistanis deserve if we don't go after those who are still threatening not only Pakistan, but Afghanistan, and the rest of the world."

Foreign policy analysts said Clinton's words were necessary to convey a tough and clear message, but that the impact on the Pakistanis remains to be seen.

"This is going to bring some realism to the relationship," said Ashley Tellis, senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, adding that Clinton's comments are a "useful corrective to the Pakistan overdependency that's at risk of developing."

Tellis said he believes Pakistan knows the whereabouts of Afghan Taliban leaders, and he said the country likely has intelligence on where some Al Qaeda members are hiding.

"They're not pursuing them aggressively enough because they fear that if they apprehend them quickly, they will not remain a target of American interest and partnership," he said.

Clinton's transparent message -- said at the highest level of government -- made clear that the U.S. will accept nothing less than a two-way dialogue, Tellis said.

But others, like Rick "Ozzie" Nelson, a senior fellow at the International Security Program in Washington, say Clinton went too far in suggesting Pakistan is deliberately dodging attempts to locate Al Qaeda.

"To say categorically that Pakistan knows where Al Qaeda leaders are but doesn't want to get them is a little bit of a stretch," Nelson told FoxNews.com, saying Clinton's frustration is understandable, but that the situation is "not as black and white as her comments may indicate."

"If we want them to help us with our security concerns, we have to be willing to help them with their national security concerns," Nelson said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.


Hillary Clinton basically tell them to take the money or leave it, nobody is forcing it upon them. :sporty55:

Video: Geo Special - Oct 28 2009 | Pakistan Herald
 
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This is silly to question Pakistan after passing the aid, these things should be checked before agreeing to give Billions away, anway this is just hot air from big mouth Hillary to pressure Pakistan nothing more.
 

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Very interesting side observation of Clinton's trip to Pak.


Giving 'tough love' to Pak, Hillary rejects mediation in Kashmir

WASHINGTON: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton concluded a turbulent visit to Pakistan on Friday by rejecting Islamabad’s persistent thesis
that terrorism could not be contained unless the Kashmir issue was resolved. She basically advised Pakistan to abandon the path of extremism and normalize relations with India using the trade route, without obsessing on disputes.

While promising to support resumption of dialogue with India on all issues, Clinton repeatedly spurned Pakistani efforts to draw Washington into the process, suggesting such an effort may be counterproductive.

"It is clearly in Pakistan's and India's interest to resolve [their dispute]. But it isn't to us to dictate a solution. That wouldn’t last a minute," Clinton said on the show "Our Voice," one of several media engagements she had in Pakistan on an extra-ordinarily public and combative three-day visit.

Pakistan’s argument, which New Delhi finds insidious, is that terrorism flourishes in the region because of unresolved issues with India, including the Kashmir problem. In not so many words, Washington is now saying Pakistan’s problems go far deeper than that, and Clinton sought to drive home the message at several engagements.

Quoting d’Toqueville at one point, Clinton advised Pakistanis to develop ''habits of the heart'' that respected other people, tolerated other view points, and developed minority rights. In several nuances remarks, she suggested Pakistan had allowed extremists have a run of the country and that was the root cause of the problems the country is facing.

Clinton repeatedly refused to be baited by questions on India or comparisons and parity-seeking with India. She ignored charges that the US had ''bent the rules'' to offer India a favorable nuclear deal and politely declined pleas to give Pakistan the same deal, while offering help in other energy sectors.

She also dismissed Pakistan’s charges that New Delhi was engaging in subversive activities in Balochistan, saying ''we just have no evidence to this effect,'' and largely ignored some sulfurous observations about India, including a comment from one female journalist that ''even paranoids have enemies and we have an enemy right across our border.''

The angry remarks played into the new US line that Pakistan’s India phobia is exaggerated and misplaced and is not shared by the rest of the world. It was also reflected in Clinton’s media engagements in Pakistan. At every event featuring Pakistani interlocutors, there were carping questions about the perceived U.S tilt towards India, the nuclear deal. Kashmir, water dispute etc. In five interviews she gave to the western media (PBS, NBC, CNN, CBS, and BBC) during the visit there wasn’t a single India reference.

Broadly, America’s top diplomat seemed to tread the emerging US line that largely de-links India from Pakistan's neuroses and engages it at a different level, a policy underscored by a state visit to Washington DC by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh three weeks from now. But more than once, Clinton also indicated that Washington will be happier if New Delhi resumed dialogue with Pakistan.

While Clinton was visiting Pakistan, India’s National Security Advisor M K Narayanan was in the US capital tying up details of the visit that officials said would aim to consolidate the gains in the US-India ties in the past decade. Also in town was Education Minister Kapil Sibal, aiming to put academic exchanges on top of the agenda for the PM's visit when a US-India Education Council is likely to be announced.

Clinton’s Pakistan trip attracted wide coverage in the US, more than a US Secretary of State’s travels typically would. But Clinton herself said at one event that its seldom that a Secretary of State spends three days in a country, and that too with such a large number of public engagements and interactions. While she ostensibly intended it to be a charm offensive, she ended up conveying ''tough love.'' Not that she was apologetic about it. ''I did not come here to make happy talk,'' she said in one interview, although she was gracious and good-humored.

But as much as three-day SoS visits are rare, even more unusual was an under-reported three-hour meeting she had with Pakistan’s army chief Pervez Ashfaq Kiyani and the ISI chief, Gen. Shuja Pasha. The meeting came soon after Clinton implicitly accused Pakistan’s military and intelligence services of being in cahoots with terrorists, but it was also an indication who the US thinks can deliver the goods in Pakistan.

Giving 'tough love' to Pak, Hillary rejects mediation in Kashmir - US - World - The Times of India
 

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times of india editorial.

TOI editorial on hillary clinton's visit to pakistan.

US secretary of state Hillary Clinton's Pakistan visit has been a lesson in adroit diplomacy. Against the backdrop of the Peshawar carnage, she
delivered a measured message, allaying fears about the conditions in the Kerry-Lugar Bill, praising the Pakistani military's efforts in South Waziristan and reaffirming the US-Pakistan relationship. But there was a sterner message couched in that non-confrontational approach. Whether Clinton's blunt comments regarding Islamabad's seeming duplicity in taking on the al-Qaeda leadership widely believed to be headquartered in South Waziristan were a deliberate ploy or merely a reaction to hostile questioning by Pakistani students and journalists, the message was clear: Washington has not been deceived.

Other statements made by her regarding the denial, the wilful blindness so prevalent in the Pakistani polity and politics, go to the heart of the problems plaguing the country today. The political space for secular parties has been occupied by weak, squabbling actors. Coupled with this is the continuing process of radicalisation of the Pakistani military and society begun under Zia-ul Haq. In the absence of a credible opposition that can function as a safety valve harnessing the people's discontent over ineffective governance and perceived American infringements of Pakistani sovereignty Taliban-style extremist factions become the only remaining lightning rod for popular resentment. In this environment, for Pakistani politicians to play to the gallery by taking populist stances on issues such as the Kerry-Lugar Bill and relations with India is marked by short-sightedness of the worst kind. By doing so, they actively contribute to the shrinking of the political space available to them, pushing more people to sympathise with hardliners who are perceived as fighting to defend a beleaguered nation and religion.

In this context, those in the Pakistani security establishment who seek to take down the Tehrik-i-Taliban for turning against the state while maintaining al-Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban as strategic assets should pay heed. So too should US policymakers who are advocating counterterrorism focusing on al-Qaeda as against counter-insurgency taking on Mullah Omar's men. These are false binaries. The links between the various factions are strong. Quite apart from the negative fallout of Washington and Islamabad working at cross-purposes, further crystallising resentment in Pakistan, such strategies would have little chance of purging the extremist elements that today threaten the Pakistani state.

The bombing campaign across Pakistan is intensifying. There are an increasing number of questions about the safety of the country's nuclear assets and the extent of radicalisation of its armed forces. At such a time, Islamabad must, as Clinton put it, start planning for Pakistan's future in earnest. To continue to indulge in the rhetoric of victimhood, on the other hand, would be the worst possible course.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/opinion/edit-page/Talking-Tough/articleshow/5186474.cms
 

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Breaking America's Silence on Pakistan

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton delivered an especially blunt, if long overdue, message to Pakistan last week. Talking to reporters in Lahore, she said she found it "hard to believe" that local authorities did not know where key members of al Qaeda had taken refuge. Her message set off another firestorm of criticism from both the government and the Pakistani press.

Though belated, Mrs. Clinton's remarks were entirely apt and, one hopes, mark a departure from U.S. policy under former President George W. Bush, and more recently, under President Barack Obama. Apologists for Pakistan in both administrations argued it was necessary to overlook the country's unwillingness to be more forthcoming on counterterrorism operations because of the U.S. dependence on Pakistan's goodwill to supply the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan. Though superficially correct, this reasoning overlooks the fact that Pakistan extracts significant rents for the use of its territory for this purpose and has also been the beneficiary of some $11 billion in American largesse over the past eight years.

Pakistan has helped the U.S. seize a number of key al Qaeda operatives on its soil, including Abu Zubaidyah, Ramzi Bin al Shibh, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Abu-Faraj-al-Libi, among others. Nevertheless, the Pakistani security establishment, especially in recent days, has done little to place the remnants of al Qaeda under a military anvil. Nor has it shown any willingness to disrupt and dismantle Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed, two anti-Indian terrorist organizations known to have significant ties to al Qaeda. Instead Islamabad has relied on every possible subterfuge to protect them, such as asserting that evidence against the two groups is inadequate and placing Lashkar-e-Taiba's leader under arrests and then releasing him. These organizations have been allowed to thrive despite Indian, American and international pressure.

The security establishment's dalliance with these terrorist groups and unwillingness to hunt down the remnants of al Qaeda might seem to be a puzzle. The Pakistani Taliban, which has close links with al Qaeda, has been wreaking havoc across the country and has attacked key civilian and military targets with impunity in Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Lahore and Peshawar. These attacks have shaken many ordinary Pakistanis from their complacency and have contributed to a growing sense of urgency in addressing the country's domestic security.

But the security establishment's terrorist links are also logical. For several decades Pakistan's security apparatus has cultivated and worked with a host of Islamist militants to pursue its perceived strategic interests in Afghanistan and in Indian-controlled Kashmir. It remains unwilling to end this partnership. While it has finally mounted a military campaign against the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, a loose umbrella group of tribal factions in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, the security force still believes it is capable of distinguishing among these various Islamist terrorist organizations as friends and foes of the state. More to the point, it remains unwilling to stop using these entities to pursue its goals of installing a pliant regime in Afghanistan and sapping Indian resources in Kashmir.

Officials within the Bush and Obama administrations have been aware of these long-standing goals. Nevertheless, to elicit the Pakistani security establishment's cooperation, however limited, they refrained from blunt, unequivocal public criticism. Now that Mrs. Clinton has finally broken the deafening silence on the subject, the U.S. needs to sustain the pressure. A high-level American official's carefully crafted and deftly delivered speech can serve as a much-needed wake-up call. However, it would be irresponsible on the part of the administration not to follow up this verbal volley with firm actions.

The U.S. needs to hold the Pakistani security establishment to account. Despite the fanfare surrounding the current military operations in the tribal regions, foreign media coverage has been severely restricted. It is thus difficult to assess the vigor with which these operations are being conducted and to measure their effectiveness. Washington could insist on greater transparency to ensure that these operations are yielding meaningful results. This would include arresting and charging key leaders and shutting down their camps at Muridke, just outside Lahore. The administration should simultaneously insist that the Pakistani security forces finally launch an offensive against Lashkar-e-Taiba and not resort to sophistry to downplay its ties to al Qaeda and its involvement with terror in Kashmir and other parts of India.

A failure to sustain pressure on the Pakistani security establishment would have widespread adverse consequences for the country, for the region and for the U.S. The costs of homegrown terrorism to Pakistan's society have been more than apparent the past several weeks. The attack on the United Nations Mission in Kabul last week while Mrs. Clinton was in Islamabad underscored the dangers that these Pakistan-based groups pose for the region. Unless the sanctuaries these entities have long enjoyed in west Pakistan are finally denied, the U.S.-led effort to stabilize Afghanistan could be in serious jeopardy.

Sumit Ganguly: Breaking America's Silence on Pakistan - WSJ.com
 

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